ay up on one of the mountain forks of The American River, is Grouse Falls, one of the highest waterfalls in North America and possibly the least known due to its difficult accessability. It comes down the mountain in three long cascades. This is the bottom cascade.

I've heard tell there is now an easily accessible path leading to an overlook now, but the day I climbed down with a Sierra Club group to see it, there was no such thing; only a hard to see, seldom used path through vines and slippery slides, and one of the last stands of old virgin growth Sequoias outside a National Park. The lumber people left this remnant alone because they couldn't get their equipment into the canyon, and there was no way to extract the great logs even had they been able to fell the big trees down there.I didn't even try to paint the Sequoias. The forest is so dense you could be standing right up against one, and only be able to see a wall of red bark. As for the river, this small pool is one of the few places you can see a sizable piece of it because the rest is hidden in dense vegetation. Actually, it isn't all that small anyway.Getting out again before dark was no easy feat, either. When we left, another fellow and I had to struggle pushing one of the women back up the trail. Judging by a two gallon still steaming pile of Bear scat we passed on the way, a difficult trail is only one of the guardians of this place.Limited edition of 100, image size 24 x 36, museum grade rag paper or canvas.